Dental professionals, such as dental hygienists, use a variety of dental instruments to clean a patient's teeth. Among the dental instruments used are dental scaler tools. Dental scaler tools driven by magnetostrictive and piezoelectric devices are used to mechanically scale and clean a patient's teeth. With use of the tool over time, the dental scaler tool wears to a degree such that continued use of the dental scaler tool becomes ineffective or uncomfortable and may cause a hygienist to use excessive pressure while scaling which may result in discomfort for the patient and the hygienist.
In the past, dental professionals, such as dentists, would replace worn dental scaler tools based upon their perceived understanding of when the tool became ineffective. A paper template has been available with a silhouette of various tips, each having two spaced line segments extending perpendictularly across the tip near the distal end. The dental scaler tool was placed on or near the paper over a silhouette of the tip type being evaluated for wear. If the distal end of the tip extended past the line segment closer to the distal end of the silhouette, the tip was considered to be appropriate for continued use. If the distal end of the tip did not extend past the line segment more distant from the distal end of the silhouette, the dental scaler tool was considered to be inefficient and should be taken out of service. However, the accuracy of an evaluation of wear of the tip of a dental scaler tool using this method could be impacted by the accuracy of positioning the tip relative to the silhouette, or the effects of parallax due to the angle from which the tip and template are viewed and any distance between the template and the tip, coupled with the small distance being evaluated, could lead to inaccurate evaluation of the extent of wear on the tip of a dental scaler tool. For example, a dental scaler tool that was worn but was still acceptable for continued use may be interpreted as inefficient and be taken out of service prematurely. Conversely, a dental scaler tool that has sufficient wear that warrants being taken out of service may be interpreted as worn but still appropriate for continued use.
The method of the invention provides an improved, robust process that more accurately and more consistently determines the extent of wear on the tip of a dental scaler tool and provides outputs that are easily interpreted while avoiding the shortcomings of previous techniques. The method may employ a holder for holding the dental scaler tool during a step in the process.